After having conquered for the eighth consecutive time the world title of constructors of the highest category of motorsport, Mercedes has had many problems since the beginning of 2022, going from being the leaders to being involved in the middle zone with the new regulations.
The efforts of George Russell and his partner, Lewis Hamilton, have been wasted by the W13’s poor performance due to repeated high-speed porpoising , something that has left them a step behind Ferrari and Red Bull.
Despite this major setback, the young British driver has managed to score three podium finishes this season, in addition to finishing in all the races in the top five. Russell was able to celebrate with champagne in Baku thanks to Ferrari’s double retirement due to engine problems, which put him just 17 points behind Charles Leclerc, the top favorite for the championship earlier in the year.
However, the Mercedes driver highlighted the importance of finding more performance in the car to be able to compete and not just achieve small successes when the rest fail.
“This is a championship where you have the opportunity to score points in every race, and no matter how fast your car is, if you’re not scoring those points, your tally is not going to go up,” Russell explained after the Baku round.
“So it’s a great job from everyone at the factory to give us a reliable car, but we can’t continue to rely on other people’s bad luck, and we have to find something else,” continued the Silver Arrows. “That’s what everyone is trying their hardest to achieve.”
George Russell and Lewis Hamilton seemed to enjoy big improvements at the Spanish test, when a major package of upgrades greatly relaxed the car’s rebound effect. However, in both Monaco and Baku, the team saw porpoising make a comeback, to the point where chief executive officer Toto Wolff echoed the safety concerns of his drivers.
The youngest of the British Mercedes pair said the W13 “felt good to drive” in Azerbaijan, balanced, but rebound was still a limiting factor: “The challenge is just on the ground, I think it doesn’t matter. what ship you’re on, or you have the porpoising and you’re touching the ground, and if you don’t you’re also millimeters from the ground skimming”.
“Sorry on my back, but we have to keep working hard to find more performance and understand what we need to do to unlock it. I don’t think we have any major updates or anything to test in Canada, but maybe by Silverstone we’ll have a better idea.” Russell concluded.
